


Third Eye

by incorrigibleIxoreus



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Consensual Kink, Established Relationship, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, From Sex to Love, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rough Sex, Season/Series 02, Season/Series 03, Slow Burn, Trust Issues, Xeno
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-07
Updated: 2015-11-09
Packaged: 2018-04-30 10:22:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5160215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/incorrigibleIxoreus/pseuds/incorrigibleIxoreus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Tell me I will be released--<br/>Not sure I can deal with this.<br/>Up all night again this week,<br/>Breaking things that I should keep...</p><p>I know that you're hiding,<br/>I know there's a part of you that I just cannot reach--<br/>You don't have to let me in,<br/>just know that I'm still here.<br/>I'm ready for you whenever, whenever you need--<br/>Whenever you want to begin."<br/>--"Hiding", Florence + the Machine</p><p>-----</p><p>Several months have passed since Julian's less than pleasant experience with the Lethean, and though physically he has recovered, the events still affect his non-waking hours. Meanwhile, he finds himself still navigating the choppy waters of Elim Garak's perplexing affections, and evaluating where to go from here.<br/>Sometimes all it takes is a sense of urgency to really put things in perspective--but what do you do when that has come, gone, and come again?</p><p>----</p><p>Introspective exploration of Bashir and Garak's characters as well as their relationship/quirks/relationship development.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Slow Morning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Knowledge of the series as of the start of this writing only covers seasons 1-3, so this could be considered a divergent fic from that point on, although that may change depending on whether I finish this before I finish the series.  
> Currently in Bashir's POV and will likely stay there for now until I get more background knowledge on Garak.  
> Rating, warnings, and tags will be adjusted as the story develops. 
> 
> Recommended listening: "How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful (Deluxe)" album by Florence + the Machine.
> 
> \------
> 
> "Don't touch the sleeping pills, they mess with my head,  
> Dredging the Great White Sharks, swimming in the bed,  
> And here comes a Killer Whale, to sing me to sleep,  
> Thrashing the covers off, it has me by its teeth."  
> \--Ship to Wreck, F + M

Elim is not a kind man. Julian knows this.  
And yet he is.  
He is the same man that keeps a private stash of Delavian chocolates set aside just for those days when none of Julian’s data matches his initial hypotheses or when yet another polite yet firm rejection letter comes in regarding the publication of some latest work.  
He is the same man who smiles indulgently when Julian gets a little too carried away on the subject of one of his current projects or past exploits over lunch, when others would have long since rolled their eyes and tuned out or abruptly changed the subject—or outright walked away.

But he is also the same man who has, in the past, repeatedly betrayed sensitive information from the station to Central Command for seemingly no other reason than that it has seemed it might benefit him.  
He is the same man whose voice, when raised in an uncharacteristically firm and authoritative manner, can cause Guls to stutter, stumble, and doubt themselves.  
The same man who tortured Odo past a point of agony, past a point of cruelty.  
He is the same man who could, at one point, elicit a confession without lifting a finger.

The same man whose steady tailor’s touch soothes the tension from his neck when he’s jerked himself awake, a strangled laugh in his throat, for the third time this week, a buzz of telepathic electricity on his temples and conduits filled with tennis balls and Altovar’s hissing chuckle crawling up and down his spine.  
This man, who has spent so much time telling lies that it sometimes seems he’s forgotten the taste of truth on his tongue, even on the cusp of death.

He is cruel, and he is kind, and he is evasive, and he is honest—in some ways, more honest than any man Julian has ever known, because he at least knows that he’s lying—and more importantly, knows that you know, and still insists; it’s more of a dance than a charade, at this point, more of a game than an earnest endeavor, his constant obfuscation.

And it’s effective.  
Whether that was always meant to be the end result or not is unclear, but it was certainly that which he found most alluring to begin with: the intrigue, the adventure, the potential for danger, when he was wet behind the ears and chomping at the bit for “frontier medicine”, whatever that was supposed to mean.  
Perhaps he got more than what he had truly bargained for—career wise, relationship wise.  
But he wouldn’t change a thing. Not for a million bars of Latinum, not for the Carrington on a silver platter.  
It simply is what it is.

Julian ponders this quietly as he absentmindedly stirs a few lumps of brown sugar into his bowl of oatmeal. O’brien never understood the habit; why not just get it replicated straight in, he’d always say, but there was something therapeutic about at least partially making your own breakfast, even if it was just on the tail-end of the process. And Miles probably understood that, to be perfectly honest, but it was one more thing to gripe about, and it was likely more the fact that Julian mussed up perfectly good Irish cut oats with brown sugar and honey that bothered him more than he was willing to admit out loud. 

His oatmeal had gone somewhat cold at this point, bordering on the texture of medigel more so than anything particularly appetizing—but he hadn’t much of an appetite this morning to start with; dreaming about dying had that effect on a person.  
It had been months since the attack, and yet…

Garak had left hours earlier to attend to his shop, but if Julian let his eyes fall closed and focused, he could still feel those cool, firm fingers trailing away from the nape of his neck as his lover swept away towards the door; it would be easier, of course, if they could simply combine quarters, but of course the Cardassian favoured his privacy, and Julian was no more willing to move across the station—further away from the Medical bay—any more than Garak was willing to be further away from the Promenade and his store. 

In Julian’s case it was mostly laziness, sure, but there was also that sense of duty, that he should be close by in case anything were to happen to any of his patients or should some emergency come up—and it was just more convenient for those nights when inspiration would strike half-way through some already-forgotten-dream about racquet ball or some such thing, providing him the solution to whatever scientific conundrum he’d been stumped on for the past week or month.

And Garak…well, Garak had his ways, and Julian couldn’t blame him for it, really. The shop was Elim’s home as much as his quarters were, his one small respite in a very large and inhospitable environment; the only two places where the temperature was almost right and the lights weren’t quite as bright and people didn’t stare or spit or snarl.  
Julian always privately thought of them as Garak’s nest, truly, but he’d never admit that out loud—whether or not it would actually offend the man or amuse him was an entirely different mystery for another day, and not one Julian had yet felt brave enough to investigate.

Sliding his more or less untouched bowl back into the replicator, Julian cleared his throat quietly, brow furrowed, resolve schooling his expression as he tidied up his scattered thoughts and began to ready himself for the day.  
Breakfast or no breakfast, sleep or no sleep, there was still work to be done, and he had about three dozen immunization reports and wellness-checks to file before lunchtime—and putting them off any longer would hardly cause them to file themselves.  
A brisk, self-assuring nod to himself as he straightened out his uniform restored some sense of bravado before pressing the pad to open the door to his quarters out into the corridor.  
Hopefully work would be able to keep his mind off things, at least for the time being.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my first DS9 fic [and my first trek fic, actually] so it's going to be a little wander-y until I get a strong grasp of their voices--this is amplified by the fact that I can't actually read any G/B fics yet, as I'm writing this mostly to help alleviate the temptation to read Garak/Bashir fic before I've finished watching the series--I've already managed to spoil myself on major plot points about ten times at this point.  
> Any non-spoilery/purely s1-3 [and soon s4] fic rec's are absolutely welcome, by the way.
> 
> Either way, feedback & patience is highly appreciated.


	2. In the Workshop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> " But your pain is a tribute,  
> The only thing you let hold you--  
> Wear it now like a mantle,  
> Always there to remind you."  
> \--Third Eye, F+M
> 
> \----
> 
> Taking a small stab at Garak. He's tough, especially without knowing very much about his backstory at this point.  
> It's a bit short, but it felt right to end it there.  
> I might be able to write more later tonight, but for now I've spent too much time neglecting my schoolwork.
> 
> Thank you for your encouragement and feedback so far, it means a lot. <3

He is a coward.  
This is today’s thought-du-jour, as it were, a heavy and soft thudding in the pit of his gut as his movements—steady, smooth, sweeping—continue without any break or pause that might betray the quiet turmoil that goes on within.

The computer projects the pattern across his work bench and with a few swift flicks of his wrist a couple modifications are made to the design—a tuck here, a dart there, move the hemline down just so and tighten the cut of the shoulders; Bajoran fashions are ever changing, which Garak finds either exasperating, deplorable, or amusing, depending on which mood has managed to catch him that day.

And there’s no small measure of irony in it, either—sometimes the irony is in the fact that such a god-fearing people would still find themselves victim to the same vanities as any other less pious, self-indulgent civilization.  
Sometimes it’s in the fact that he, being who and what he is, with the talents that he has found himself endowed with and the skills that he has honed, is now held captive to the whims of such a weak and short-sighted people.   
Responsible for setting the stage dressings and costume design for a laughable, intrepid troupe in which none of the actors know the name of the play, much less their own lines.  
Stuck catering to a planet of pawns who, even worse, still have yet to realize that that is what they are, and resent him for knowing it to be true.  
It leaves a sour taste in his mouth on the best of days.   
  


His lip curls, and a sharp hand gesture dismisses the projection, leaving behind nothing but a stunning hand-woven fabric he’d managed to get his hands on a week ago from a Lyrean merchant who’d been passing through.  
It’s slightly reflective, in an iridescent, shifting sort of way, but rather than being slick to the touch as one might expect, its surface has a delicate tooth to it.  
Not enough to be abrasive, but just enough to have substance.  
Truly lovely.

The tailor spreads his palms across it thoughtfully, thumb catching delicately on one of the pins securing it to the soft padding of the bench.  
Julian would probably like it. Perhaps he should set this one aside, instead—but then again, it was a rare day when he could get the Doctor out of his uniform, anyway.  
Well. Out of, and into something different, rather.

Garak found it rather perplexing, frankly; he’d examined that uniform in depth and from the blend of the fabric to the cut of its fit, it didn’t seem particularly comfortable, or at least not so much so that it should warrant priority over any other available clothing options—so, it must be a matter of pride.  
Or loyalty, perhaps.  
The principle of the thing.  
Principles, Garak understood—contrary to popular belief.  
Ascribing those principles to physical objects, on the other hand…

He never did have much use for attachments, whether to people or to things. That went without saying, of course, after all; he did blow up his own shop just a month ago. Julian had scolded him for it when he’d finally told him—well, something along the lines of the truth, more or less. Something close enough that he could deduce, in any case. He was getting better at reading between the lines.  
Not good enough, yet. But better.

Just one month.  
Garak’s nostils flared as the memory of electric-singed smoke and a concussive throb through his skull flashed to mind, and a moment later it was gone.  
But what remained was still that single, steady, persistent thought:  
Coward.  
Garak’s fingers delicately traced the ridges that curled across his cheek bone to his brow, Enabran’s softly, sweetly vacant voice echoing through the stillness of the shop.  
“Next time,” he had said. “We’ll know better, next time, won't we.”  
There was something powerfully sickening, seeing his Mentor in such a state—it twisted his gut and stiffened his spine like something degenerative and incurable.  
Enabran Tain was a great man, and to have been beaten at his own game in such a seamless, flawless way had shattered him, and what was left, but a confused husk.  
A kind of weakness, a mindlessness that was deeply unnerving in the most profound of ways, for what was a man like Tain without his mind?  
Nothing.  
It shook Garak to his core.  
The last lesson Enabran would ever teach him, and perhaps his most valuable--perhaps.   
He hadn't quite finished unpacking it yet, dissecting it, deconstructing and reconstructing it--and at this point he'd done so so many times that the images were seared into the inside of his skull and he found himself veering on the side of weakness and temptation, longing for distraction and longing for relief.

He had left him there to die—well.   
Had he, though, really?  
He was already dead, Garak reasoned.  
In more ways than one.   
With the effective dissolution of the Obsidian Order, not to mention the failure of such a massive and illegal coup, even if Garak had managed to save his mentor from the wreckage, it would’ve been little more than a brief respite before being tried before the Archon, and even then they would have been trying a corpse.  
Tain was dead the moment the first wave of Jem’Hadar uncloaked.  
Arguably, Tain was dead the moment he first took Lovok into the fold.  
And in all honesty...in some ways, Tain was dead the moment he filed for retirement, although it was his crowning achievement to do that which none had expected ever possible or even plausible--perhaps it had never happened before, not because none of Tain's predecessors had been quite as cunning or clever as him, but because they had the foresight to realize that you could never retire from the Order, not really. They were cut from a different cloth, the kind that was ill-suited for being set aside and moth-balled for posterity. Tain, for all his wiles, in all his arrogance, didn't recognize it until it was too late.   
And Garak...Garak was never afforded that luxury.  
In the end, he knew: there was nothing that could have be done, really.  
To save Tain, to save himself.  
But still, it was there, whispering.  
Coward—and if not in this instance, then in so many others.

For the love of Cardassia, he had claimed—  
But for all the rare truth and weight the statement carried on his tongue, in the echo chamber of his mind it felt hollow.

  
For the love of Cardassia, he was here, tweaking the latest Bajoran fashion in a quiet corner of a frigid Starfleet-run station.  
There was a certain poetic measure of futility in this farce, at least.  
A quiet smile split across the tailor’s face—although there was no one here he had to convince, except, perhaps, himself—and he unclipped a small set of laser scalpels from his belt, chuckling softly as he set to work on the pinned fabric with the precise, keen exactitude of a surgeon.

  
For the love of Cardassia.  
At least for now.


	3. A Lively Debate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaand this is why I changed the rating of the fic from Mature to Explicit.  
> You've been warned.  
> This is pretty tame, but I've added some additional warning tags, too, because this is going to come up more than once since it's kind of central to the plot/relationship development of the story.
> 
> Once again, thank you for your support, and I hope you guys enjoy this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it. <3
> 
> \---------
> 
> "Chained and shackled, oh--  
> All unraveled, oh--  
> It's a pity, oh--  
> Never to return,  
> But I never learn."  
> -Which Witch, F+ M

“You were distracted at lunch today.”

Nimble fingers are deftly undoing the clasp of his uniform jacket as he himself makes short work of Garak’s vest, the feather-light touch of lips against the corner of his jaw pausing momentarily as he pulls back to tug Garak’s shirt up and over his head.

“Was I?”

Julian’s voice is light, innocent, unassuming—he’s picked up bad habits.  
He’s still not a very good liar, and forces-that-be willing, he never will be, but he’s certainly gotten better at it—or at least more accustomed to it.  
It helps that Garak never really calls him on it; they spar verbally almost every day, and it’s something of an unspoken rule that the first person to break the façade is the defacto loser by default.  
Naturally, Garak almost always comes out on top, but lately he’s been getting the hang of it more and more, and he’s not sure whether that’s good or bad.

“Mm. You hardly said two words. Am I to believe you’ve grown bored of our lively little debates, dear Doctor?”

The Cardassian’s brow ridge is quirked slightly as he tosses his shirt to the side, having pulled it the rest of the way over his shoulders and head.  
His expression—almost mirroring Julian’s tone—is light, playfully concerned, lips pulled into a disapproving frown as he steps forward into Julian’s space again. 

“Why, Garrak,” He parries. “I’m surprised at you. How on earth could you think such a thing of me. Truly, I’m hurt.” 

Taking a page out of Elim’s book, he furrows his brow in mock-pain, taking a half-step back to cross his arms—or attempting to, anyway, and it’s a short-lived attempt as Garak, gaze still locked firmly with his own, has continued in his advance and has now returned to divesting him once more of his uniform jacket and the thin grey turtleneck beneath it.

“If I didn’t know better, my dear, I’d say you were avoiding the subject.”

His eyes are sharply focused, with that dark look about them that always makes Julian wonder--

“If I didn’t know any better, Garak, I’d say you were interrogating me.”

His back hits the wall with a soft thump and the space between them is rapidly closed—the lights in the room are dim as always and a sharp contrast to the corridor he left only moments before, but he doesn’t miss the slight quirk at the corner of Garak’s lips as the Cardassian finally breaks his gaze to return to kissing lightly along the side of his jaw and neck. 

“Oh, believe me, dear Doctor—if I were interrogating you, you’d know.”

The tone of his voice has dropped just a pitch, and it’s so soft he can barely hear it over the steady dull-roar of the station’s internal mechanisms—but it throws a cascade reaction down the nerves in his spine and his breath hitches, ever so slightly.

Garak pauses in his ministrations for a moment before returning to them as though he hadn’t noticed, thoughtfully filing that bit of information aside for later consideration.

Julian, meanwhile, was personally preoccupied with running his fingers across the smooth, scaley ridges on the sides of Garak’s ribcage before curling delicately against his neck crest, nails digging into the slick flesh in between the scales ever so slightly and eliciting a quiet intake of breath—almost a hiss—of his own from the Cardassian.

Garak’s physiology never fails to fascinate him, both from a scientific standpoint—study of Cardassian anatomy was understandably limited in the Federation—and from a purely tactile angle as well; for some, the novelty might’ve worn off by now, but there was something about cool, silk-smooth scales and blindly mapping out the almost-symmetry of those crests and ridges with his fingers and lips that was endlessly entrancing to him. An unexplored topography all his own to survey and analyze.

Beyond that, as with any partner of a physiology more or less entirely alien to his own, he relished the challenge of learning just what buttons to push to really make things interesting.  
The fact that Garak’s…unique skillset and personal history meant he was exceptionally well-versed in revealing only precisely what and how much he felt intent on expressing at any given moment simply made the challenge more alluring, quite frankly.

Just one more of their peculiar little pseudo-adversarial games.  
Julian did wonder, occasionally, however, if that—couching any sort of relationship or interaction in some shade of combativeness—was a “Garak” thing, or a “Cardassian” thing, and so far from his experiences and the anecdotes of those around him (biased though they may be), he’s begun to suspect it’s a little of both, with a side of “Obsidian Order” thrown in on top for good measure.

A soft groan is dragged from his throat as Garak has moved on from light, tender kisses to delicately his teeth into the crook of his neck—a favoured spot of his; something about Julian’s lack of protective neck ridges seemed to fascinate him, and he varied in his attentions there in an almost experimental fashion. The response seemed to encourage him in this case, and the hand which had found itself resting on Julian’s him instead began to trail its way up his abdomen, feather-light touch barely making contact and eliciting another rush through the doctor’s nervous system, causing him to shudder ever so slightly. 

The almost-touching was infuriating and borderline torturous, and he knew it—Julian had made the mistake once (only once) of commenting on it in a moment of particular frustration—and since then Garak had made a point of drawing things out as long and slowly as he possibly could, and it seemed to get worse every time they were together—almost as if he was hunting for a breaking point.

“Garak,” he groaned, trying to keep the frustration out of his voice to little avail, and arching his back away from the wall and into the Cardassian’s touch—which proved to be a futile exercise as Garak, too, withdrew only just enough to maintain the exact same level of pressure he’d been exhibiting in the first place. The only difference was that the hand which had been steadily creeping its way up his chest had stopped now at his solar plexus, paused thoughtfully.

“Yes, my dear?”

Feigned innocence as he continued exploring the curve of Julian’s collarbone with his mouth, nipping lightly before following up with his tongue, tracing the bone in almost surgical precision which, were he with anyone else at the moment, Julian might find slightly unnerving. At the moment, instead, it merely served as a quiet reminder that this “Tailor” could take him apart at the seams, had he the inclination.

“Bloody hell—“ he muttered, all articulate nuance lost on him for the moment as those fingers started moving again, tracing the outline of his pectorals before stopping just over his nipples. “Please, Garak,”

“Please what?” 

That slightly dark tone had slipped back into Garak’s voice, like pulling down the shades or dimming lighting controls; almost imperceptible, but enough, if you were paying attention. And Julian was certainly paying attention at this point.  
Captivated, even.

“I—fuck—“ 

Julian choked on the words as Garak’s nails scraped gently against his areola, circling the flushed brown skin in a sweet, deceptively loving fashion that would seem to be sensually gentle and caring—except that he knew better than anyone at this point that it wasn’t enough, was far from enough, and the teasing was hardly short of murder.

“In good time, Doctor.”

He sounded casually dismissive, as though they were discussing something as inane as the weather on Bajor or the latest holosuite selection Quark had managed to acquire, and Julian nearly voiced further complaint before Garak’s touch suddenly became firm, pinching almost cruelly while his other hand, which had been lightly exploring the curve of his ribcage pushed Julian’s back flat against the wall, unyielding.

The sound it dragged from his throat this time was both pained and relieved and after a brief moment of complete mindlessness—he always short-circuited just a little bit when Garak pulled a number on him—Julian managed to revive his hands from where they had fallen, useless, at his sides.  
Two could play at this game.

“Or, you know, as they say, ‘Time is of the essence,’” he quipped breathily, fingers hooking into the waist-band of Garak’s trousers as he pulled the Cardassian flush against himself, locking eyes with a defiant sort of smirk.  
Garak, who had been studying his expression in that moment of mindlessness, remained impassive; his face, which contorted in emotional acrobatics at the drop of a hat during any out-of-rooms interaction, tended to return to a more…unreadable state behind closed doors. 

Julian found it fascinating how Garak didn’t just lie with his words, but with every inch of himself, putting on a show that was as unmistakable as it was obvious, but it was nonetheless effective: it caused people to underestimate him. Much like the masters of the drunken fist, Garak’s antics served him well as a means of unpredictability.  
After all, if you were secure in the knowledge that you could always tell when someone was lying to you, you’d never really see it coming if they chose to elevate the level of their deception beyond what you’ve come to expect from them. 

“My dear Doctor, if you have somewhere you need to be, by all means, don’t let me keep you,” Garak murmured softly, in contrast to the tight, twisting pinch he was still applying to Bashir’s nipple for another few beats before releasing it and moving to the opposite side, his other palm drifting up to press against the soft bump of the doctor’s adam’s apple. Thumb and forefinger framing the corners of Julian’s jaw and the heel of his hand applying just enough pressure to the base of his throat to cause another quick spike in pulse, Elim continued to examine Julian’s expression with a rapt sort of focus. 

“Oh, well in that case, Quark did mention this new holosuite program I thought I might check out—“ Julian’s smirk didn’t waver, still boyishly defiant as he feigned sudden disinterest, quickly removing his hands from where they had been fiddling with the closure to Garak’s pants and raising them up in mock surrender.

Garak quirked his brow again, dramatically splaying his fingers as he stepped back, too with flourish. Heat flushed across Julian’s chest as the blood rushed back to his nipples in the absence of their captor, the withdrawal of cool skin against his leaving him feeling suddenly entirely too warm and knocking the last nail into the coffin of his resolve. 

“Oh, to hell with it, you win,” Bashir growled softly before lunging forward and impatiently capturing Garak’s lips with his, cool relief flooding through him at the press of Garak’s chest pressed flesh against his own too-hot skin. His arms wrapped possessively around the Cardassian’s ribcage, nails digging into the tender connective tissue between the thick ridges lining Garak’s shoulder blades. 

A soft, clicking rumble struck another quick thrill down the nerves of his spine as Garak pushed back against him, pressing him back into the wall with renewed attention. His hands, having been briefly still splayed to either side of him immediately went back to work trailing their way down Julian’s sides, occasionally digging in with a bruising pressure in an unpredictable, experimental exploration of tender spots—between and under his ribs, against the base of his spine, the cusp of his hip bones, to the dip of his groin where his trousers cut off access for the time being.

Julian’s hands, on the other hand, had granted Garak’s now somewhat tender shoulder blades a brief reprieve—the thin skin between the ridges flushed deep blue from his ministrations—and instead tangled themselves in the Cardassian’s dark hair, nails scraping at the sensitive, scaled scalp hidden beneath it and tugging gently, just enough to encourage him to tip his chin back obligingly and opening his throat up to a tenacious onslaught of nipping bites. 

Garak had just managed to unhook the clasp at the front of the doctor’s pants when one less-than-gentle bite on the crest of his neck ridge elicited a sharp hiss through his teeth, and faster than Julian had seen him move on most occasions the doctor found himself pinned against the wall by his throat again, though this time the pressure was enough to make breathing something of an exercise.  
Still, a quiet chuckle worked its way out of his lips, which were quirked to the side in a lop-sided, self-satisfied grin.

He looked, for a moment, as though he were about to make another quip, but his words were cut short by another throaty groan as cool fingers found their way around his already stiff cock, gripping firmly at first, possessively, almost threateningly, before returning to that infuriatingly delicate tracing motion that Garak favoured so much. Garak, who had composed himself again and was once more studying Julian’s expression as it crumpled into abandon.

This was how it went, more often than not, with Julian coming apart at the seams and Garak—well, being Garak.  
Were he in a better or more sensible state of mind, it might bother him, and it likely would later, once he was alone in his quarters again, but at the moment the good doctor found himself rather much fresh out of fucks to give.  
If Garak found some sort of perverse pleasure in finding new ways to take him apart, then so be it, it wasn’t as though they weren’t both getting something out of this arrangement, in one way or another.  
Still, a nagging voice tugged at the back of his mind, a kind of pang in the recesses of his chest, before another firm and steady stroke choked out any chance of focusing on much of anything besides the heady orgasm flooding his system.

His hands, tangled tightly still in Garak’s hair, loosened their grip to trace almost tenderly across the ridges lining his orbital sockets, thumb pressing softly against his lower lip before moving down across the ridges that framed his jaw and curved elegantly back into his aural shells and hair.  
The tailor let him, the hand that had been gripping his throat sliding away as he pressed close again, chest to chest, cool Cardassian skin soaking up the heat that way now radiating off of Julian in waves.

A relaxed, comfortable sigh slipped out as he tucked Julian’s forehead against the ridge of his throat, marveling in the sensation of mammalian sweat slicking the contact between them and dampening the doctor’s now more than slightly rumpled hair.

“So,” he elicited, tone once more brightly conversational, as though they had just concluded some debate over lunch.  
“Quark has a new Holosuite programme?”

**Author's Note:**

> I don't currently have a Beta reader and it's been a very long time since I wrote anything, so I'm going back repeatedly and editing this story as it develops. Nothing major--mostly phrasing, grammar, typos, and occasionally adding a few lines or paragraphs in parts that feel a bit thin after the fact.  
> If I change anything major or heavily relevant to the plot development I will make a notice of it at the beginning of the latest chapter and/or whichever chapter the changes affect.  
> Thank you for your patience and understanding <3


End file.
